Mazda is experimenting with affixing a rotary engine range-extender to electric versions of its 2 subcompact hatch.

For those holding on to hope that Mazda will revive the rotary engine for a successor to the RX-8, we suggest you stop gripping so tightly. The automaker’s performance ambitions, as in the 24 Hours of Le Mans, now rest with diesels. Still, Felix Wankel’s rotary may be back in a different capacity, working as a back up in an electric 2.

Mazda is conducting an engineering study with a prototype model it calls the 2 RE Range Extender. It’s based on the brand’s Japanese-market limited-lease 2 EV, but has a 38-hp, 333-cc rotary engine—and a 2.6-gallon fuel tank—mounted beneath the trunk, which spins a generator via a belt. This provides electricity for the lithium-ion battery housed beneath the floor, which supplies juice for the 101-hp electric motor powering the front wheels. Mazda says that upgrading its EV with the range-extending equipment should up range from 120 miles to more than 200.

Mazda says that it opted to use a rotary in this application because of the engine’s quietness, lack of vibration, and compact size. Of course, there’s also the nostalgic “Historical Mazda brand equity” of the rotary.